Whereas I love the new edition of Specify7 and user management appearing to be really powerful now, I’m stuck waddling about a simple task: Adding an existing user to another collection.
For instance: I have a user, Tom Schiøtte, which has been connected to the “Invertebrate Zoology” collection in Specify for a very long time. This user needs to be added to a newly created collection called “Exhibitions”. So I log on with my admin access and head to the Security and Accounts section.
First I try to look up the user at the institution level. His username is “schioette”. I then select the collection “NHMD Exhibitions” from the dropdownlist and tick off “Enable Collection Access” and “Full Access - Legacy” (He’s marked “Collection Admin” for InvZool).
Assuming an agent needs to be assigned to this user for this particular collection/discipline, I also add that, believing all should be OK then.
I move down to hit “Save”:
But then, for some reason, Specify7 demands that I also set agents for all other collections, even though these are not relevant at all.
If that user is set as a Specify 6 Admin, that automatically grants collection access to all Specify collections for that application.
To achieve a similar effect, you can remove the Admin status in Specify 6 permissions, you can set the collection individually and change the User Group to “Manager”.
By checking the Collection Access checkbox under the Collection heading individually you will not need to grant collection access at the Institution level.
Unfortunately, this is not the answer. I understand my colleague @ZsPapp has been writing extensively with you on this issue and she’s in a bit of a pickle. Actually we all are, since we need to introduce a host of new end users to the platform and this gives it a bad rep. I hope you can help her get to the bottom of this soon.
Unfortunately, this is not the answer. I understand my colleague @ZsPapp has been writing extensively with you on this issue and she’s in a bit of a pickle. Actually we all are, since we need to introduce a host of new end users to the platform and this gives it a bad rep. I hope you can help her get to the bottom of this soon.
I have worked with @ZsPapp to find a solution in the meantime for this issue. We have created placeholder agents in each division so that permissions can be changed and applied to existing Specify users without any issues!
From what I can tell, it looks like the issue @ZsPapp was encountering was related to existing users when their permissions were changed. As for new users, you need to first create an agent for them in the desired divisions and then a new user account can be made and assigned to that agent.
We have pushed a fix in the next release (arriving next week) to allow the creation of agents from the query combo box in the Security & Accounts panel!
We have pushed a fix for this issue in our latest version of Specify 7, but for now, you can work around this by creating an agent in each of those divisions (at the database level or through Specify) and assigning those temporarily.
It looks like the Placeholder agent was assigned to someone who has permission in those divisions, so now they are being used.
